“I am continuing to think about this word that we don’t yet have to describe a religious point of view that sees all conventional religions as inadequate human constructions, that have not been able to communicate the experience of an ultimate reality that transcends us. […] I am thinking now about these possibilities: 1. Transtheism […] 2. Numinalism”

“For [John] Toland, this was not just another apocryphon. From this ‘Turkish Gospel being fathr’d upon Barnabas,’ he claimed to have been led to recover “the original plan of Christianity” as centered on Jewish-Christian beliefs that ‘Jesus did not take away or cancel the Jewish Law in any sense whatsoever.’

This, Toland argued, was the very oldest form of Christianity, only it was lost to history when ‘converts from the Gentiles… did almost wholly subvert’ it. On the basis of the Gospel of Barnabas, Toland characterized the most ancient Christianity as harmonious with Islam as well: its account of Jesus, after all, was perfectly conformable to the traditions of the Mahometans [i.e., Muslims], who maintain that another was crucified in his stead; and that Jesus, slipping thro’ the hands of Jews, preach’d afterwards to his disciples, then was taken to heaven.”

“At least from the evidence now at hand, there’s little to support the theory that the GBarn is authentically ancient. The question, rather, is why this possibility continues to arise again and again despite the paucity of evidence. Why is the idea of this gospel—and speculation about its possible suppression—so compelling to modern readers? How has on-line speculation about a Syriac manuscript of an obscure apocryphon risen to the status of e-Rumor, spreading widely through social media and persisting for years?”

“… I’m assuming deities contemporaneous with Christianity are just fine, so grab your Pope cards and take the next flight to Chesterfield, Subgenii: These folks clearly need ‘Bob’ and his redeeming message of Slack.”

“Artist Leonardo Ulian offers another interpretation of the mandala with his assemblages of electronic components, copper wire, and more. The intricate, finely detailed works radiate the innards of what makes technology tick. Ulian crafts smaller geometric patterns within a larger, more general shape that become more impressive once you see close up shots of his handiwork.”

“The outside of the building melds surprisingly well with its surroundings. However, this all changes when you walk inside. As soon as you step through the entrance, the vibrant lighting and futuristic decor make you feel like you’re on the set of the latest terrible sci-fi dystopian flick. It’s prompt validation that this is not your average church.”

“Be Here Nowish had a soft launch last month and now emerges in its entirety, picking up where the main characters, fuck-ups in their own right, left off, finding themselves in Los Angeles among a group of freaky devotees of a guru played by Kyp Malone from TV on the Radio.

Adam, are you personally involved in any of the kooky spiritual stuff that’s going on in Los Angeles?

“Entering altered states of consciousness has a dramatic effect upon a ritual. Everything becomes more profound, from the smell of the incense, to the colour of the candlelight, to the feel of your wand in your hand.”

“But whence the week? Throughout history, human societies have found it useful to divide time into groups of days shorter than a lunar month. One of the most common uses of this cycle has been to establish a regular market day, though just how regular varies. At one point, the Basques evidently employed a three-day week. For centuries, China, Japan, and Korea employed a 10-day week. Other societies have employed four-, five-, six-, eight-, and nine-day weeks.”

“So were vampires ghosts? Were ghosts vampires? These days most of us can easily distinguish between a vampire and a ghost and would consider them two very different phenomena. Examples from antiquity, however, suggest a blurring of these distinctions which lasted until the modern era. This overlap in the supernatural has caused much consternation among scholars who study the undead, complicating what would otherwise be neat categories.”

“You know, Saint Isidore of Seville was declared the patron saint of the Internet and computers by the vatican. You can imagine confession as the ultimate data-mining and blackmail tool. The church had to coerce people with the idea of infinite hell to get them to confess, and they could still lie if they wanted to! Now we just give away access to every single piece of ourselves for free. So the need for protection from Saint Google is very real.”

“We get flicked in the nuts by a badminton birdie we’ll double over for 20 minutes, moaning and rocking back and forth. Our balls are like little yarn-bundles contained in a thin, wifty sack of outlying flesh. They unspool like bobbins of delicate thread when damaged. Women on the other hand push entire people out of their lady-realms like divine fucking beings.”

The publisher’s blurb claims that this novel “graphically portrays how Satanism has infiltrated our culture through music, medicine, education, the media, and in many more subtle ways.” While the story clearly contains no objective facts regarding the Satanic conspiracy it alleges to dramatize, it does form an interesting case study in psychosocial projection. The Satanists are portrayed as focusing their efforts on raising a generation of indoctrinated drones, recruiting them from
· children whom their parents wanted to abort,
· Satanically-dominated day care centers, and
· Satanic infiltration of public schools.

I have yet to see any evidence of Satanism on those three fronts, but it does not escape my notice that evangelical Christians are perennially interested in those venues for the indoctrination of children with the worship of their Jehovah-Jesus caricatures.

Similarly, the Satanically-inspired New Age movement is supposed to be based on promises of “rebirth without a great deal of anxiety”—which is exactly how the individuals “saved” in the novel experience their conversions to Christianity. Oh, there’s anxiety about the Satanic hordes of course, but not about Jesus! Just desperate contempt transformed to insipid reverence.

Temple of Set founder Michael Aquino is an offstage presence in the narrative, invoked as “Martin Andreno…the top Satanist in the nation.” And the author, writing in 1991 e.v., assures the reader through the voice of a repentant New Age guru, “By the year 2000, they will have everyone who hasn’t become a Satanist living in moment-by-moment fear of their lives.”

Predictably, the Christian heroes of the text are given plenty of opportunity to express their abhorrence of sex, drugs, and rock’n’roll. In an unexpected piece of dialogue, the protagonist and an arch-Satanist discuss atheism, with the pastor-hero defending the moral sensibility of atheists, and the Satanist deriding them for “having no belief at all.” Author Elwood seems to have misplaced his Christian evangelical script, in which atheists are tools of Satan.

Bewildering indeed is the novel’s climax, in which a Native American, recently converted to Christianity and armed with a bow and arrow(!), serves as emergency reinforcements for the hero, in a pyrrhic attempt to rescue the Indian’s own son from crucifixion by Satanists.

Observing the commercial success of the Left Behind novels, I can only hope that the last two decades have seen improvements in the standard for pop-Christian evangelical paranoid fantasy stories. [via]

“I close my eyes and seize it
I clench my fists and beat it
I light my torch and burn it
I am the beast I worship…

And I know soon come my time
For in mine void a pale horse burns
But I fear not the time I’m taken
Past the point of no return.
Wage war like no tomorrow
Cuz no hell there won’t be one
For all who deny the struggle
The triumphant overcome

Trips to where, few have been
Out of thin air, upon high winds
Rites begin when the sun descends
Have felt what few will ever know
Have seen the truth beneath the glow,
Of the ebb and flow, where roots of all mysteries grow
I am below, so far below
The bottom line
Transmitting live, transmissions rise
From the depths out of controlled by
Suspended glance of an unblinking eyes
Imminent gaze cast ‘pon the path that winds
‘Pon the path I find, and claim as mine
To ride the waves, of unrest
Made to make me shine as a testament
To why the ways of the blind will never get
Shit but shanked by my disrespect
Dismiss this life, worship death
Cold blood night of serpent’s breath
Exhaled like spells from the endlessness
In the bottomless wells of emptiness
Channeled to invoke what we represent

Secret order
Elitist horde of
Creeping fire
Seizing power
Riders of the lupus hour
Eye on palm
Time is gone
Moonlight drawn
Fly til dawn
Sacrifice to rise beyond
Deep inside the violent calm
Of the coming storm
In blood sworn
To glorify and for life adorn
With all that dies to become unborn

I close my eyes and seize it
I clench my fists and beat it
I light my torch and burn it
I am the beast I worship…
I am the beast I worship

In the time before time eyes ‘bove which horns
Curve like psychotropic scythes
And smell of torn flesh bled dry
By hell swarms of pestis flies
Vomiting forth flames lit by
An older than ancient force
That slays this life with no remorse

The spiral storm
Of flames inside
The torch I raise
The force I ride

Feel my vessel go up in flames
Flesh torch lit by thee unnamed
Direct connection to the source
Vestment of unnatural force
Forever burning black torch
Wisdom of the old and true
Possessed by the chosen few
Shining to reveal the ways
Of a darkness that pervades
All that is and ever was
Inferno of witch’s blood

Worship is not on bended knee
Nature knows not of mercy
To pray is to accept defeat
Power pisses on the weak
Bow and beheaded by the beast
Beggar on a bitch’s leash
Scum is desperate for relief
Worship is the way I ride
Witching currents through the eye
Of storms that force the false to die
Worship the flames with which I rise
Into apocalyptic skies

Harsh winds flay mine flesh to bone
In splintered skeleton I roam
Wastelands with not to call my own
But the path I walk alone
The hunger burns, within my gut
As my bones turn into dust

And I know soon come my time
For in mine void a pale horse burns
But I fear not the time I’m taken
Past the point of no return
Wage war like no tomorrow,
know well there won’t we one
For all who deny the struggle
The triumphant overcome …

I close my eyes and seize it
I clench my fists and beat it
I light my torch and burn it
I am the beast I worship…
I am the beast I worship”